Kate Zambreno

How to discuss my four-star review of a book like this which I loved reading, but why? Of course, the many literary musings on [a:Franz Kafka|5223|Franz Kafka|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1569196898p2/5223.jpg], [a:Rainer Maria Rilke|7906|Rainer Maria Rilke|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1493785350p2/7906.jpg], [a:Wittgenstein Ludwig|17502615|Wittgenstein Ludwig|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], [a:Fernando Pessoa|7816|Fernando Pessoa|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1427039317p2/7816.jpg], [a:W.G. Sebald|6580622|W.G. Sebald|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1465928875p2/6580622.jpg], [a:Walser Robert|17396751|Walser Robert|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], [a:Roland Barthes|13084|Roland Barthes|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1548241743p2/13084.jpg], [a:Elena Ferrante|44085|Elena Ferrante|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]. The movies, of course, not only Hitchcock's Vertigo but films of [a:Chantal Akerman|83688|Chantal Akerman|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/f_50x66-6a03a5c12233c941481992b82eea8d23.png], and the artworks of [a:Albrecht Durer|11321023|Albrecht Durer|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png](esp. Melencolia I), [a:Paula Modersohn-Becker|519430|Paula Modersohn-Becker|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/f_50x66-6a03a5c12233c941481992b82eea8d23.png], [a:Joseph Cornell|25401|Joseph Cornell|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], and others new to me such as [a:Pipilotti Rist|83699|Pipilotti Rist|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] sending me to the Internet almost as often as the narrator. The flâneur quality of the narrator's days roaming New York City and its museums. Her correspondence on writing with friends and students. Adoration of her dog, Genet, and concern for a feral striped cat in the neighborhood. Bodily functions (needs to be more "body" in your writing, said my creative writing teacher). Concerns about work, money and food, and eventually, in the final third of the book, the misery and heaviness of her first pregnancy.
I could not put down this collection of "drifts" or intimate vignettes salted with a few hazy photos (the old lady neighbor stayed with me). The author confesses: "What I longed to write was a small book of wanderings, animals. A paper-thin object, a ghost. Filled with incandescence toward the possibility of a book. (a) torn-apart book of myself." And she has.
If you liked [b:Pond|25333047|Pond|Claire-Louise Bennett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1428656359l/25333047._SY75_.jpg|45069198], [a:Sarah Manguso|52289|Sarah Manguso|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1252535357p2/52289.jpg], [a:Rachel Cusk|46051|Rachel Cusk|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1268246552p2/46051.jpg], [a:Olivia Laing|4463840|Olivia Laing|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1465720235p2/4463840.jpg] and appreciate the work of photographer/writer [a:Moyra Davey|417744|Moyra Davey|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1591072002p2/417744.jpg], this will captivate you, too.… (mehr)

There are some disagreeable reader comments about the author's excessiveness in this book, but I applaud its combination of memoir and literary commentary about the women writers who are psychologized and pathologized by their creative male partners, i.e. [a:Zelda Fitzgerald|28243|Zelda Fitzgerald|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1427041106p2/28243.jpg], Vivien Eliot ([b:Painted Shadow: The Life of Vivienne Eliot, First Wife of T. S. Eliot|387266|Painted Shadow The Life of Vivienne Eliot, First Wife of T. S. Eliot|Carole Seymour-Jones|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320451660l/387266._SY75_.jpg|376903]), [a:Jane Bowles|100439|Jane Bowles|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1188820906p2/100439.jpg], [a:Jean Rhys|25022|Jean Rhys|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1240501946p2/25022.jpg], June Miller ([b:Henry and June|11068671|Henry and June|Frederic P. Miller|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348797248l/11068671._SX50_.jpg|15989973]), [a:Sylvia Plath|4379|Sylvia Plath|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1613135175p2/4379.jpg], [a:Anaïs Nin|7190|Anaïs Nin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1585811222p2/7190.jpg], as well as fictional characters in [a:Virginia Woolf|6765|Virginia Woolf|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1419596619p2/6765.jpg], [a:Kate Chopin|5132|Kate Chopin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1224805370p2/5132.jpg], [a:Gustave Flaubert|1461|Gustave Flaubert|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1651461896p2/1461.jpg], [a:Anna Kavan|119148|Anna Kavan|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1229532760p2/119148.jpg], [a:H.D.|26807|H.D.|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1477748341p2/26807.jpg], [a:Elizabeth Hardwick|5268|Elizabeth Hardwick|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1260770659p2/5268.jpg]'s[b:The Ghostly Lover|432714|The Ghostly Lover|Elizabeth Hardwick|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1488394349l/432714._SY75_.jpg|421672], etc. In [a:Charlotte Perkins Gilman|29527|Charlotte Perkins Gilman|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1238281005p2/29527.jpg]'s [b:The Yellow Wallpaper|8217236|The Yellow Wallpaper|Charlotte Perkins Gilman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1276430319l/8217236._SX50_.jpg|17352354], the doctor tells the woman writer "to never touch pen, brush, or pencil as long as you live." [a:Kate Zambreno|3501330|Kate Zambreno|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1544727000p2/3501330.jpg]'s "mean reds," fears of abandonment, her IBS and endometriosis, obsessive shopping, and her history of depression and sleeplessness hence shrinks, pills, hospitalization as one of the "slit-your-wrist girls" is accused of writing which is too personal, too emotional, too excessive. As [a:F Scott Fitzgerald|35843930|F Scott Fitzgerald|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] said to [a:Zelda Fitzgerald|28243|Zelda Fitzgerald|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1427041106p2/28243.jpg], "you were going crazy and calling it genius." While some of the stories were familiar, I was sorry to finish this amazing and enlightening book and I was grateful for the extensive bibliography of over 150 books and articles about these women's lives. My TBR quakes under the strain.… (mehr)